Business of the House

Chris Bryant Excerpts

Thursday 2nd July 2020 Commons Chamber

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

The right hon. Lady is always so difficult to follow because she so often ends with sad news. The news from my hon. Friend the Member for Hexham (Guy Opperman) was the saddest. There is so little one could say that could possibly give any comfort, other than for him to know that he has many friends in this place, and our hearts bleed for him. It is the saddest, the hardest, the most unbearable news, and we wish him and his wife every condolence and sympathy that we can.

To move on to politics, let me start with the right hon. Lady’s tribute to Mark Sedwill. She is obviously right to pay tribute to him—he is an enormously distinguished public servant—and to the civil service generally. The team that supports the Leader of the House is something that—dare I say?—the shadow Leader of the House should be enormously jealous of; I have a feeling she may be. I am brilliantly supported by extremely hard-working people who do a fantastic job. I have no idea of what their political opinions are at all, but they back the Government in what the Government are trying to do. The Northcote-Trevelyan approach to the civil service is one that has served us well for a very long time, but it sometimes needs a degree of updating. Even I am not so wedded to the 19th century that I feel nothing can be improved.

The appointment of David Frost as National Security Adviser is an utterly brilliant appointment. He is an enormously qualified man and a very distinguished diplomat, and many people are beginning to say that he is the Henry Kissinger of our time. He is a great and distinguished public servant, who will serve enormously well.

[Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)]

There is a lot of irony in that.

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

The hon. Gentleman is quite incapable of keeping quiet, even for a moment. His agitation and his degree of excitement may be slightly theatrical on this occasion.

On the ISC, as always, that will be set up in due course. It would be wrong to be “Russian” these things—[Laughter]—as I am sure the right hon. Member for Walsall South (Valerie Vaz) appreciates. [Interruption.] No, it was not, actually; it was quite deliberate.

On the Cumberlege review, I actually gave evidence to that review in relation to Primodos. This is an opportunity for me to pay the greatest tribute to the hon. Member for Bolton South East (Yasmin Qureshi), who has campaigned absolutely tirelessly. I first met the hon. Lady when we were both elected in 2010 and had offices opposite each other, and she took up this issue when nobody else was really interested. She has transformed people’s thinking about it, and I look forward with great interest to what Baroness Cumberlege has to say about Primodos. It is a very important issue.

Going back to some of the other questions, the right hon. Member for Walsall South is a kind and generous person, and her sympathy for Cabinet Ministers having to queue is much appreciated by my right hon. Friends, who have to take on these onerous things which are otherwise unknown across the country. Our constituents never have to queue for anything because life is so smooth and easy, but she appreciates that right hon. Ladies and Gentlemen having to queue is so burdensome and tough, and makes us realise that we are really earning our living as we stand in a queue. Remarkably, it takes almost exactly the same time to pass through the Division Lobbies as it does when we are using the Lobbies without social distancing. The speed with which we got through them earlier this week was pretty much the normal speed and therefore things are working: Government business is getting through and scrutiny is taking place. I am not as kindly or as soft-hearted as the right hon. Lady, and I think a Cabinet Minister queuing for a few minutes is no bad thing, and probably spiritually enlightening and uplifting.

The right hon. Lady referred to renters who have lost income. Emergency provisions were made: £1 billion has been made available to help people who are renting. The Government are very conscious of the need to protect people who are in the private rented sector.

The right hon. Lady also mentioned the Prime Minister not making a speech in the House, but making it outside the House. However, the Prime Minister came to the House just a week before and made a statement. We are having a statement on Wednesday next week from the Chancellor of the Exchequer. The Government have been assiduous in maintaining the ministerial code’s requirement to make major announcements to the House first, and this is part of the natural process of government.

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[Mr Rees-Mogg]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for raising this issue and for the tribute he paid to the Attorney General and the Solicitor General, who work extremely hard to ensure that just sentences are passed. I seem to remember—others may correct me—that the law that allowed that to happen was introduced when Margaret Thatcher was Prime Minister, so it is another Conservative success. My hon. Friend is right to highlight it and raise it in the House: perhaps he should ask for an Adjournment debate to discuss specific cases where the punishment is fitting the crime.

[Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)]

It is very clear now that if the easing of the lockdown is to be effective in tackling coronavirus, it will happen at different paces in the different nations of the United Kingdom but also in different parts within those nations. We see the situation in Leicester, and there may be others—who knows—and we know that some sectors will be affected for longer than others. The Leader of the House rightly said that where the state says a business cannot operate, the state should step in to provide financial assistance. I heard what he said to my hon. Friend the Member for Batley and Spen (Tracy Brabin), but I do not understand whether the statement from the Chancellor next Wednesday will be just a 10-minute statement with questions for perhaps an hour—in that case, I urge him to make it more like three hours—or one with a proper series of debates so that we can get into the nitty-gritty. By the way, can I still have my £2.5 million for the tip in Tylorstown?

[Mr Speaker]

May I help a little? It will be a minimum 20 minutes from the Chancellor, and it will be run long, with many more questions than normal.

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[Mr Rees-Mogg]

I never realised that our separatist friends would model themselves on an Ealing comedy. It seems to have become “Passport to Pimlico”. There are no internal borders in the United Kingdom; it is one country, I am glad to say. [Interruption.] There is a difference between borders, and districts and areas. That is self-evident. A border is something that one may stop people crossing. Even I am not suggesting that we make people from Gloucestershire present their passports before coming into Somerset.

[Chris Bryant]

Then why mention Pimlico?

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

As the hon. Member for Rhondda will remember, in the film “Passport to Pimlico” Pimlico was thought to have belonged to the Duke of Burgundy or some such, and therefore had become an independent state within the United Kingdom. Our separatist friend wants to do the same by insisting on passports to Scotland, and Mrs Sturgeon wishes to build a wall. [Interruption.] Unfortunately Mrs Sturgeon’s policy is not fictional. Many of us wish that it were and that the separatists were a bit more fictional, but they are not. They are here and they bang on about it constantly, but we are still one country and Scotland benefits enormously from being part of the United Kingdom.

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[Mr Rees-Mogg]

The two great newt fanciers were Gussie Fink-Nottle and Ken Livingstone. They were always interested in newts, and I am sure that they are—

[Chris Bryant]

One of those is fictional.

[Mr Rees-Mogg]

The hon. Gentleman is really alert this evening. He has pointed out that Gussie Fink-Nottle is fictional—

[Chris Bryant]

It is morning, not evening!

[Mr Speaker]

It is usually afternoon when the House sits. Carry on!